Saturday, March 18, 2017

EXTRA: Chuck Berry just as much a part of 2120 S. Michigan lore as the most hard-core of Chicago bluesmen

Chuck
Berry died Saturday. At age 90, it shouldn’t be a shock.

And
while he was a St. Louis native who towards the end of his life spent much of
his time and talent at "Blueberry Hill," a Missouri nightclub he owned, the
honest truth is that Berry is as significant a figure in the whole Chicago
music scene’s history as anyone else.

FOR
BERRY WAS amongst the musicians who recorded at the one-time Chess Records studios
on South Michigan Avenue that is largely remembered because of the cast of
hard-core blues musicians who made their bones there.

That
record label’s catalogue is still out there, what with MCA continuing to
release the old recordings of artists such as Muddy Waters, Willie Dixon,
Howlin’ Wolf and the ladies such as Etta James and Koko Taylor.

But
while Chess Records might well have had the blues of black America at its core
of operations, the fact that the record label had a crossover such as Berry on
its roster was a significant boost to the label’s bottom line.

You
could argue that it was the presence of Chuck Berry that helped keep the record
label alive as long as it lasted (into the mid-1970s), and that it might well
be Berry’s affiliation with the bluesmen that helped enhance their own
legacies.

CHESS
AND THE many old bluesmen might well be long forgotten and 2120 S. Michigan
Ave. might well be nothing more than an obscure reference used by the Rolling
Stones to title an early instrumental number they performed on one of their
first records.

The
fact was that Berry was the showman who helped put the flash in early rock ‘n’
roll, which is why we remember him while other artists such as the Flamingoes
and Jimmy Cavallo and the House Rockers (all of whom appeared in the 1959 film “Go,
Johnny Go!”) are long forgotten.

And
why pop culture references to Berry remain humorous.

Berry appeared as himself in cinema

Remember
the old Cheech and Chong gag about how Berry was the true king of rock ‘n’ roll
because he went to jail for it? Or how in the film "Back to the Future,"
character Marvin Berry supposedly called his cousin, Chuck, during that zany
guitar performance by actor Michael J. Fox’s “Marty McFly” character – implying
that Chuck Berry was taught his style by someone who was actually ripping him
off!

PERSONALLY,
I ALWAYS enjoyed listening to Berry’s guitar playing and thought it a shame
that his first “Number One” record was that silly and trivial “My Ding A Ling.”
When his solo to “Johnny B. Goode” may well be the ultimate one that any
aspiring guitar player tries to rip off for his own.

Personally,
I still don’t have it down after all these years of strumming on guitars in my
spare time.

And
now, Berry is gone. Although the records he created in the Bronzeville
neighborhood studios (an era recollected in the 2008 film “Cadillac Man” that
even included Berry’s role in the record label’s success) are ones that will
continue to live on.

Although
the record industry may well be a pitiful shame. Because as it turns out, Berry
had been working on a new record album of fresh material – his first new
release of the 21st Century.

Mos Def portrayed Berry in '08 film

IT
WON’T MATTER how bad it will be; in fact, I’ll bet it probably will be
mediocre. But it likely will sell well, and may well turn out to be one of his
highest-selling records ever.

We’re
good about paying tribute to people once they die and aren’t capable of
appreciating or enjoying the praise. Just like the Chicago Cubs' Ron Santo getting into the Baseball Hall of Fame posthumously.

The conspiracy-theory part of my mind is almost warped enough to suggest that Berry somehow faked his death to help boost his record sales. Except that common sense tells me rock 'n' roll already has enough "Elvis is Still Alive" conspiracies that we don't need tales popping up of Chuck Berry sightings outside a White Castle on the Sout' Side.

And on a final note, I'll acknowledge a personal favorite when it comes to Chuck Berry's recordings. For me, one of the pleasures of the Christmas holiday is that I can shamelessly overplay “Merry Christmas, Baby,”
one of the few holiday-themed songs that doesn’t
become monotonous and that I can hear over and over and over each year.

I am a Chicago-area freelance writer who has reported on various political and legal beats. I wrote "Hispanic" issues columns for United Press International, observed up close the Statehouse Scene in Springfield, Ill., the Cook County Board in Chicago and municipal government in places like Calumet City, Ill., and Gary, Ind. For a time, I also wrote about agriculture. Trust me when I say the symbolic stench of partisan politics (particularly when directed against people due to their ethnicity) is far nastier than any odor that could come from a farm animal.